Commander Steve
Carson is one of
four duty command
officers at the
National Marine
Operations CentreThe Coastguard has seen big changes in recent years.
Will Bruton goes behind the scenes at the National Marine
Rescue Coordination Centre to learn about its modernisation
Inside HM
Coastguard’s
Operations Centre
M
any yachtsmen saw a
major overhaul of HM
Coastguard, announced
at the height of
government cutbacks,
as a cost-cutting exercise in disguise. Since
that announcement several years ago, little
has been seen publicly of what has emerged
from the project in terms of infrastructure
improvements. In reality, prior to the reforms,
the UK Search and Rescue operation was
reliant on a combination of HM Coastguard
and military infrastructure, linked by
telephone and dependent on a steadily
aging fleet of 1960s-designed aircraft.
Seeing the need for a more joined-up
approach, the MCA decided to reduce the
number of Coastguard stations and develop
new technology that would deliver more.
But how does it work? And what does
it change, if anything, for UK yachtsmen?
Powerful transmissions over VHF radio
from HM Coastguard are something all
of us are familiar with hearing, but the
operation behind the broadcasts has
been through a period of significant
modernisation in recent years. A newly
centralised infrastructure and responsibility
for a privatised helicopter rescue operation
for the country has demanded big changes
behind closed doors. Yachting Monthly took
a close look at how today’s HM Coastguard
runs 365 days of the year and continues to
deliver a world-class service.
You might imagine the Coastguard’s state-
of-the-art operations centre to occupy a
precipitous position with a commanding viewof the English Channel, or perhaps one of
the many towers now run by volunteers
of the National Coastwatch Institute that
they used to occupy. Instead, the National
Marine Operations Centre, or NMOC, can
be found at the far end of an industrial estate
on the edge of Fareham in Hampshire. It’s
not a secret, but it might at well be.
Equipped for any doomsday-like scenario,
it is a secure compound, complete with two
backup generators and enough diesel to run
independently of the national grid for weeks
on end. Tellingly, there is absolutely no view
of the sea. Instead, the building is loaded
with the latest technology and a team that
undergo extensive training before becoming Alan Dop /AlamyTHE KNOWLEDGEThe NMOC’s EPIRB desk can
see activated emergency
beacons and the satellites
that track them in real time